There’s no good reason for alarm over high court ruling on legislative prayers

Tuesday

May 6, 2014 at 12:12 PMMay 6, 2014 at 2:11 PM

Ordinarily, I take a hard line against government endorsement of religion. The establishment clause of the First Amendment forbids such proselytizing, as I see it.

But I part company with most of my fellow purists on the matter of yesterday’s 5-4 ruling by the U.S. Supreme court allowing legislative bodies such as city councils to begin their meetings with prayer.

It’s important to note that the majority and the minority in this case were not at odds on every aspect of the issue. The majority was not completely oblivious to First Amendment niceties regarding church-state separation. And even the court’s four dissenters in this case agreed that a legislative forum “need not become a religion-free zone,” in the words of Justice Elena Kagan.

I see this latest ruling as relatively innocuous, partly because there are precedents for it.

This decision was narrowly focused on legislative prayer, a practice that has an unusually long and specific American tradition dating back to the Framing and even to the Continental Congress in 1774; it does not speak to how courts should consider other references to religion, such as on monuments, on city seals, in holiday displays, and the like. And while Justice Thomas repeated his view that the Establishment Clause should not be seen as incorporated by the Fourteenth Amendment against the states, no other Justice joined that view.

Ordinarily, I take a hard line against government endorsement of religion. The establishment clause of the First Amendment forbids such proselytizing, as I see it.

But I part company with most of my fellow purists on the matter of yesterday’s 5-4 ruling by the U.S. Supreme court allowing legislative bodies such as city councils to begin their meetings with prayer.

It’s important to note that the majority and the minority in this case were not at odds on every aspect of the issue. The majority was not completely oblivious to First Amendment niceties regarding church-state separation. And even the court’s four dissenters in this case agreed that a legislative forum “need not become a religion-free zone,” in the words of Justice Elena Kagan.

I see this latest ruling as relatively innocuous, partly because there are precedents for it.

This decision was narrowly focused on legislative prayer, a practice that has an unusually long and specific American tradition dating back to the Framing and even to the Continental Congress in 1774; it does not speak to how courts should consider other references to religion, such as on monuments, on city seals, in holiday displays, and the like. And while Justice Thomas repeated his view that the Establishment Clause should not be seen as incorporated by the Fourteenth Amendment against the states, no other Justice joined that view.